


In Sickness and Health

by miloron (ocoa)



Category: NU'EST
Genre: AU - College, Dissociation, Established Polyamorous Relationship, Hinted depression and suicidal ideation, Insomnia, M/M, Sleeping drugs, Trigger warnings:, WIP, anxiety mention, cuddling i guess, they have issues and they deal with it together, writing as i go
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-02
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-08-14 18:20:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16497806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ocoa/pseuds/miloron
Summary: Minhyun wakes up feeling like his mind is suspended in the sea, feeling the roll of waves and muffling the world around.Jonghyun can’t sleep can’t think can’t calm the anxiety in his head.--A story about how the five of them fall apart and into each other





	1. Minhyun

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on Twitter for prompts and potential storylines: @ocoauffs

Minhyun wakes up feeling like his mind is suspended in the sea, feeling the roll of waves and muffling the world around. He doesn’t recognise the sun pouring through the crack in the curtains and he doesn’t recognise the 14:24 that stares back at him from his essay filled desk. Minhyun’s eyes flutter open and close with the beat of his heart sounding far away. He can’t move, can’t bring himself to move. He’s tired, not physically, not from the deadlines he has that has been building up from the past few weeks. Coincidentally, so have his crushing spirals. 

The door clicks open, soft and gentle, and Aron walks in.

“Hey,” he whispers, and Minhyun barely registers it. The bed sinks when Aron sits on it, and Minhyun feels fingers stroke through his head. And they just sit like this, Aron stroking his head to the count of their breath, from the hairline breathe in to the middle of the scalp breathe out repeat. Aron whispers softly, voice carrying just barely over the sound of the air conditioning rumbling. He talks about the day, how he and Dongho sat in at home, how Jonghyun and Minki went out for the day, how Minhyun was doing great.

He keeps repeating the last one in different words and Minhyun feels his eyes prick. Aron is smiling through it all when Minhyun’s vision clears, and he doesn’t feel like his head is under a drugged haze. Minhyun just manages to push himself up and onto Aron, and Aron’s sweater covered, warm, soft, dependable arms wrap around him and hold him close.

There are days that the thoughts don’t go, and then there are days when they do.

Minhyun sinks into the warmth, and feels the safest he’s felt in a long time.


	2. Jonghyun

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow me at kwaks43 on twitter if you want to see a lot of retweets of aron photos and occasional proclamations of adoration to aron :)

When Jonghyun first starts taking sleeping pills they’re prescribed. 1 pill a day, at least until the anxiety medication he’s given starts to stabilise his condition and he can sleep better. And they work, they really do, a bit too well in fact, because the pill a day stops working and his psychiatrist hesitantly allows him to take 2. 

Hs housemates (best friends, really) make sure he doesn’t go overboard, but the stress of university starts to makes things happen and he lies awake at 5.45am with a lecture at 9.30, and technically if he slept now he could eat at least 3 hours of sleep but the problem was he could feel the pills in his system, making him drowsy but not _sleepy_. He can’t sleep. He stares up at the ceiling, body fine tuned to the creaks of the houses and the familiar sound of Minki softly breathing in the bed beside his but his body twitches to do something.

Should he study? He hadn’t managed to cover the text for the lecture the next- the current day and he was falling behind. Not by much, but enough that he could get lost during his class. Yeah, he should. He wills his limbs to move but they don’t.

Maybe he could fall asleep now?

He closes his eyes, but his mind is very very awake. He sighs, and it comes out louder and harsher than he expected. His finger taps distractedly, sluggishly, but it doesn’t make him want to leave the bed or sleep.

He thinks he’s about to start laughing, though that might be the hysteria he’s quietly keeping under wraps.

The door creaks open, and he freezes. If he stays in this position maybe whoever at the door would think he’s sleeping. He briefly conjures an image of a dark shadow, a story his mother told him to scare him from sleeping too late.

He recognises the pull and shuffle of Minhyun’s feet, the dip of his bed. Jonghyun leaves his eyes closed, but nearly startles when he feels Minhyun’s hand carding through his hair. Ah, right, Jonghyun didn’t throw the wrappers of his pills away. He thought he forgot about something.

Minhyun’s hand is warm. It always is. None of them struggle when he wraps his arms around them because his arms were always a comfort. The feeling of his palm feels engraved into Jonghyun’s skull, but that may be the 5 hours of sleep he managed in the past four days making his senses run into overdrive. He wants a hug. He wants to cuddle Minhyun. His skin itches.

Pretending to be asleep he rolls over, and he can practically feel Minhyun’s smile emanate when crawls into the space Jonghyun makes for him. Minhyuns height is nice, Jonghyun’s chin fits right into the crook between Minhyun’s head and shoulder. It’s warm.

He still can’t sleep, but the anxiety fades and he can feel his heart slowing down. Minhyun’s cotton t shirt doesn’t itch as much as his own, which is weird because they’re wearing the same shirt they got for the orientation program they were asked to help out in.

He doesn’t know when he falls asleep, but when he wakes up it’s 3.45pm, he missed his class, and theres an email from Dongho with a recording and a summary of the class. He pushes down the panic, and fires a quick message to Dongho for thank him for the favour.

Minhyun’s left by his bedside lunch and a cup of water which must have been warm because it tastes boiled. “Try and go back to sleep after you eat,” the note says, “left a book or you to read.”

It’s the Big Friendly Giant, and Jonghyun smiles.

He thinks, vaguely, still sleep wracked and half alive, that maybe he should change his current pills to something else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t really have insomnia, I just kinda have a terrible sleep cycle (i sleep from 5am to 2pm LMAO) so if i got this wrong then sorry. These are just a few signs I’ve picked up from my sister who does take seeping pills. 
> 
> Some drugs have extremely bad reactions with your body, so please do try to explore options if you need to. If not, explore non-medicated options. Personally sleep inducing tea (like chamomile and lavender) makes me more anxious at night but if that works for you then please try it out.

**Author's Note:**

> Recently I had a lot of these episodes when I would just get lost in my thoughts. I usually deal with it using music, but sometimes it doesn’t help. Also decided to write this after finding that there’s apparently such thing as suicide prevention ASMR. I haven’t heard any but it does exist. I’m amazed by that. Anyway, hope all of you are feeling good. 
> 
> Also happy birthday to our superstar Choi Minki, you are the baddest bro out there and you will one day rule the world.
> 
> > Follow me on twitter @kwaks43!


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